What is a Servlet?
Java Servlets/JSP are part of the Sun’s J2EE
Enterprise Architecture
The web development part
Java Servlet
is a simple, consistent mechanism for extending
the functionality of a web server
Are precompiled Java programs that are executed
on the server side.
Require a Servlet container to run in
Latest Servlet Spec is 2.3
May 13th, 2003
What is a Java Server Page
(JSP)
Java Server Pages (JSP)
A simplified, fast way to create dynamic
web content
HTML or XML pages with embedded Java
Code or Java Beans
Can be a mix of template data in
HTML/XML with some dynamic content
A JSP is a complied to a Java Servlet
automatically by the Servlet container, it is
then cached
Latest JSP Spec is 1.2
May 13th, 2003
Why Use Servlets?
Work well in a Heterogeneous Environments
OS and platform neutral
Work with all major web servers (IIS, Apache,etc..)
Well defined Web Architecture framework
Standard built in services such as:
Standard Approach to Authentication using
declarative security vice programmatic security
Database connection pooling
Complete support for sessions via cookies and/or
URL re-writing
Has automatic fallback to URL re-writing
May 13th, 2003
Why Use Servlets Con’t?
Robust Object-Orientated API in Java
language
Ever try to maintain a large ASP, Perl, or PHP
site
Clean separation of Controller/Logic
from Presentation
Efficient, scales very well
There are good free Servlet/JSP
containers and connectors
That run under both UNIX and win32
May 13th, 2003
J2EE Web Application
Components
Java Servlets
Extend off of HttpServlet
JSP pages, normally for Presentation
Java Beans
Normally used as value objects, pass to data to
JSPs
Tag Libraries – XML based JSP elements
Web Deployment Descriptor
/web-inf/web.xml
May 13th, 2003
Web Deployment Descriptor
/web-inf/web.xml
Part of the standard
Defines servlets used in the web application
Maps servlets to URLs
A servlet can map to many URLs
Defines resources available to the web app
Defines security constraints
Defines other stuff like
Welcome file list
Session timeout
Error page mapping
May 13th, 2003
J2EE Web Directory Structure 1
Top Directory is normally the context Path
/tomcat/webapps/servletdemo
Normally, the URL would be
http://localhost:8080/servletdemo
Contains JSP and other static content plus the web-
inf directory
/web-inf directory
This is a protected directory, can not point browser
to any file in this directory
/classes – unpacked web application classes, auto-
magically added to CLASS_PATH
/lib – web application JAR files
/taglib – tag library descriptor files
May 13th, 2003
J2EE Web Directory Structure
2
/web-inf/web.xml
/web-inf/*
Would normally put any static or JSP files
here
Protects them from Direct Invocation
Always best to call a JSP through a servlet
first
May 13th, 2003
JSP Constructs 1
Used in JSP pages, pages that end *.jsp
Comment <%-- Comment --%>
Declaration <%! int x = 0; %>
Expression <%= expression %>
Outputs to the Response stream
Like a “printf” to the browser
Do NOT use semi-colon to terminate the line
Scriplets - contains Java Code
<% code fragments %>
May 13th, 2003
JSP Constructs 2
<% if (value.getName().length != 0) { %>
<H2>The value is: <%= value.getName() %></H2>
<% } else { %>
<H2>Value is empty</H2>
<% } %>
Implicit objects always available in the JSP
Page
“request” – Browser’s Request Object
Use to get HTTP headers, length etc..
“response” - HttpResponse Object
May 13th, 2003
JSP Constructs 3
“session” – internal HttpSession Object
“pageContext”
“application”
“out”, same as <%= %>
“config” – servlet configuration
“page”
“exception”
JSP Directives
Are messages or instructions to the JSP
container
May 13th, 2003
JSP Constructs 4
Do not produce any output
“page” directive
<%@ page import=“com.lucek.*” %>
Commonly used for importing class paths
“include” directive
<%@ include file=“header.htm” %>
Good for including static content
“taglib” – lists the tag library descriptor
location
Required when using tab libraries
May 13th, 2003
Java Beans as Used in Web
Apps
Normally used for all data transfers and
business components
Similar to how Java Beans are used in Swing
and AWT
But do not need the full implementation
Must have no constructor or no-arg constructor
Must have setter and getter methods for each
property value
JSP constructs/tags use Java Beans
May 13th, 2003
JSP Actions
JSP actions are special tags that affect
the output stream and are normally used
with Java beans
Most commonly used:
<jsp:useBean>, <jsp:getProperty>,
<jsp:setProperty>
The code below will display the lastName
property of the student bean on the output
stream
<jsp:useBean id="student" scope="request"
class="com.lucek.dto.StudentValue" />
<jsp:getProperty name="student"
property="lastName" />
May 13th, 2003
Servlet Container/Engine
Servlets/JSP require a Container
Apache Tomcat is the reference implementation
of the Servlet/JSP Specs
It is open source, small, install quickly,and is
FREE
Latest Version is 4.1.24
Web Site: jakarta.apache.org/tomcat
It include a simple HTTP 1.1 server, good
enough for development and small intranets.
May 13th, 2003
Tomcat Install
Requires a JDK, get 1.4.1 and install into
c:\jdk or $HOME/jdk
Add JAVA_HOME to your environment
and the “bin” directory to your PATH
Good practice to unpack into c:\tomcat
or $HOME/tomcat
Add CATALINA_HOME to your
environment and the “bin” directory to
your PATH
May 13th, 2003
Tomcat Directory Structure
Everything is relative to $CATALINA_HOME
/bin – Startup/shutdown scripts
/conf
Server.xml – main configuration file
/common – common class and jar files used by
Tomcat and web applications
Put JDBC drivers here
/server – class and jar files used by Tomcat internally
/shared – class and jar files for all web applications
/webapps – This is where you put your web application
in a sub-directory or external context file.
May 13th, 2003
Starting Tomcat
/bin/startup.bat or startup.sh
Point Browers to http://localhost:8080,
should see default page
All the Docs are there on the default
page!
Check out the examples pages, good
tutorials
May 13th, 2003
Other Development Tools 1
Ant Build Tool
Standard Java Build tool
Basic on UNIX make, but much better
Site: http://ant.apache.org
Install in c:\ant or $HOME/ant
Java IDE
Try NetBeans, it is nice
Tomcat is built in, but is an older version
Includes full Servlet and JSP debugging
Site: www.netbeans.org
May 13th, 2003
Other Development Tools 2
Junit
Standard Automated Unit Testing Tool
Site: http://junit.sourceforge.net
Jedit
Slick Programmer’s Editor
Written in Java
Site: jedit.org
May 13th, 2003
Simple Servlet Application 1
See “servletdemo” code
Mount the servletdemo, servletdemo/java/src,
and servletdemo/web in NetBeans Explorer Tab
For a Hello World Servlet look at:
Java/src/com/lucek/action/HelloWorld.java
To build and run
$ cd servletdemo
Setup the proper build variables in the
build.properties file
$ ant all
$ ant deploy
Point your browsers at
http://localhost:8080/servletdemo
May 13th, 2003
Simple Servlet Application 2
Look at the web.xml file and how the
same servlet can be mapped to many
URLs
Look at SimpleBean.java which should
how to pass a Java Bean to a JSP page
Look at the different ways a bean’s value
can be obtained in the EditStudent.jsp
May 13th, 2003
Best Practices/Patterns
Always Separate out the logic from the
presentation
Use servlets for the logic/controller and JSP’s for
presentation
Ideally should never have Java Code in the JSP
page
Have a clean separation between your data
access and controller layers (DAO)
Always use DTO or value object
Use a Model-View-Controller Architecture
Do not write it, use Struts
Site: jakarta.apache.org/struts/
Use Unit tests
Junit Automation via Ant build tasks
May 13th, 2003
What we have not talked about
All the specific Servlet APIs
Tag libraries
Sessions, cookies
JDBC service support from the container
Container based authentication
Lots of other stuff
May 13th, 2003
Next Presentation?
Create a data driven web site using
MySql and Servlets/JSP
Setup Authentication Realm with
declarative security
Setup JDBC connection pooling
Struts?
May 13th, 2003
